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Category Archives: Libya

I should comment quickly on the current events in Libya with regards to the Constitutional Draft Assembly’s (CDA) proposal. I should also comment on some of the circumstances in Libya that point to the difficulty of imposing a constitution in general besides current fissures.

After the photo-ops of the Paris meeting between Hafter and Sarraj, a deal that will let the Italian Navy tackle migrant smugglers in Libyan waters came under scrutiny. The deal was initiated by the GNA (UN-recognized) and critiqued immediately by the political camp of Eastern Libya and certain camps in Western Libya. Libya is already a playground for many countries. However, within the GNA there is interesting discord. A deputy went on television (Al -Ahadath TV?) and made wild accusations towards the the head of the GNA Sarraj. The deputy, Fathi Majbri, disagrees but this calls into question not the decision making process of the GNA but why there should be such displays. As if himself and Sarraj never discussed such serious policy when they have been vested with significant political powers.

It calls into question what the Presidential Council of the GNA is supposed to be. Is it rule by committee? Certainly in Libya’s climate centralization in order and command is needed but not one from a strongman. Majbri seems to argue that the PC is supposed to argue and debate issues. However, that’s probably useless since in Libya no group or body has any respect for it’s own rules. Besides Majbri, there are other members of the PC who conduct their own mandates and don’t follow the agenda of Sarraj, the appointed head and executive. Further down the chain, supposed GNA forces are nominal at best and are really mercenaries hired to be placeholders for the army. The are often allowed to continue their extortion of civilians and enjoy a culture of impunity for their crimes.

The breakdown goes to the East as well. The Wershafana area south of Tripoli is controlled by tribal militias and closer to Tripoli by Misratan militia (Brigade 301 in Swani at the moment). The Wershafanian militias levy “taxes” on freight trucks carrying food into Tripoli from farms outside the city. They commit carjackings in mid-day brazenly and just happen to be tied to Hafter’s Libyan National Army. Hafter’s claim is that his group is the only one functioning like a state institution. However, these acts continue in the region. Closer to Hafter, a Major named Werfalli executes prisoners and he’s within the organization.

The impunity is not so much the root cause of the war’s continuation as much as the disrespect and neglect of order is the cause of impunity. So many groups will find allies but will dump them not for political reasons. After all, everyone claims to be for a united, reconciled and democratic Libya. They don’t trust each other causing an escalation of commitment that has nothing to do with philosophy or tribalism. This escalation of commitment makes the constitutional draft a pointless piece of paper. People won’t commit to organizations they created to solve problems. Militants won’t even consider sincerely working for a Libyan state.

The project for a Libyan state in the GNA lacks an agenda that it is clearly committed to. At best it’s a placeholder to stop an Islamist government from stepping in that will involve the Gulf further in Libya turning it into Syria. It lacks the power of some historic governments in exile and that should frighten the UN mission in Libya.

After the Libyan revolution, plans to form a new country fell apart. There are various reasons. To name a few, lack of outside support and ulterior incentives created by Gulf nations. However, something often forgotten is the order of steps taken to form institutions. In particular, the formation of a relatively large elected body to write a constitution, which devolved into an albatross with now viable outline to date.

There were good intentions behind the formation of the Constitutional Drafting Assembly (CDA). It was pushed by concerns for representation and democracy. However, it became a monster designed by committee. There were too many people, with little incentive to work together and with objectively wrong intuitions about what a draft up for vote will look like.

Constitutional design is written about extensively in political science. In particular, mixed constitutions and constitutions for mixed populations has been discussed since Montesquieu. Nonetheless, much of the lessons in literature have not been headed. It’s not that the CDA in any draft lacked an understanding of what governments do or how governments should function and what powers to give which individuals. Rather, the CDA devolved into a partisan and sectarian mess in a fairly homogeneous society by being overly concerned at an constitutional level with representing minorities in writing when constitutions act as a securer of negative liberty most effectively by limiting government and defining its parameters. In a country as a unstable as Libya, minority rights deserve broad protection but the specifics played out unnecessarily. When incentives let groups overplay their hand and the constitutional drafting process is setup without risking the reputation of every single member severly one gets the current result.

The main cause is not that the Tebu have weapons or that Amazigh have weapons. Rather, it’s the idea that one can write a constitution in such a detached manner where the draftees are not held to account because they exist as large partisan blocs and there are many of them. They are not pushed to simplify and focus on the philosophy of the government they desire for their countrymen but rather become bureaucrats managing portfolios. It detracts from the discussion, wastes time and makes the process of building a constitutional democracy less reputable. It’s without a doubt a popular sentiment on the Libyan streets that CDA is pointless and spineless.

How can this be avoided? Changing the order in which the state is formed is the main solution. The NTC should have been firm in adopting an alternate of an older Kingdom-era document with alterations and without federalism, leaving the first elected parliamentarians the sole individuals responsible for amendments. All they needed were to enshrine freedom of expression into the any 1960s Kingdom constitution and write a preamble commemorating the shared dignity Libyans gained from the fight against tyranny. Leaving, their representatives the job of forming the specifics, such as language recognition and islamic justice. This is because much of what we would like to make of what is justice or moral as a society comes with time rather than what can ever be fitted to any charter of any kind. While positive rights can be enshrined successfully in constitutions, in instability they are harder to enforce (especially when there is no document that unites disparate parties).

To specify:

NTC leadership writes minimalistic charter based on older documents to create a common ground for courts (would solve the issues of mutiny in Libya East to West).

GNC and HoR later would add amendments (only as additions) and codify a living document to describe their duties, limits and functions.

Canada, after repatriation of its constitution, and the United States form perfect examples of the way forward for Libya on constitutional design. It is the terrible order of operations that does not force people to act to support of good institutional design and rule of law. It would be illogical to suppose Libyans do not understand what is needed to protect their rights from tyranny.

The Central Bank of Libya (CBL) is interesting insofar as such an institution resists to some extent the partitioning of the country. It and the Libyan Investment Authority (LIA), the holder of much of the state’s frozen assets, have tried to treat both governments equally while also ignoring their requests for termination of various staff. This independence held until the House of Representatives (HoR) in Tobruk opened their own office in the city of Bayda and decided two days ago to print their own currency. Not a separate currency, but instead decided to go ahead with the money printing the financial committee at HoR believes is needed. The UN-designated Presidential Council disapproved of the maneuver but then after meeting their competing partners in the HoR they reversed course.

Looking at the graph above, M2 percentage change is negative since 2015. One should note that the Economist Intelligence Unit, and for that matter most data sources I reviewed do not have reliable data on Libya since 2014 (the official start of the current crisis). From 2014 the data above is noted as an estimate by analysts but it does seem to match the internal estimates of the CBL here and here. Nonetheless, I think it’s crucial to see the precarious situation that the CBL, HoR and Presidential Council is placed in with regards to Libyan monetary affairs.

For one, culturally in Libya households have held on to money since depositing cash into commercial banks would limit spending since banks are limiting withdrawals due to cash shortage. This has been a way of life for most Libyans I know. In Tripoli, since 2015, cash withdrawals have been limited to varying degrees. As of recently at major commercial banks it is 500 dinars per customer. The driving factor is both poor economic performance and money hoarding in Libya. In particular, the money supply (generally across all measurements) has been ‘flat’ since 2014 but inflation has crept. Driven by turmoil in the country (likely a supply-side shock). This brings in to question, should the central bank print no matter the consequences to alleviate the cash shortage that effects every day lives or wait for a political solution to occur.

The reason I mention the political solution, is that a large amount of Libyans earn an income from the state, especially young people who traditionally in Libya got their first job working for the government (quick read on the post-revolution economic situation for youth here). However, public revenues have fallen considerably. This has dramatic effect on the aggregate demand of the economy. That and a fall in the productive capacity due to the fall in oil production and increased private sector rigidity really leave the central bank, and more importantly the government(s), in a variable situation.

Source: Central Bank of Libya, Economic Bulletin 2015Q2

In my opinion, I would bite the bullet and print the money. I don’t think Libya will have sky rocketing inflation due to general low exchange of hard currency due and it’s supply-side constraints that are tied up in politics and war. It is worth it only because it would breath life into the business sectors in Tripoli, Misrata and Benghzai, where idle businessmen can’t pullout their own funds to do work with.

This recommendation and much of the analysis is mired with poor data. Employment information is limited as most sources have the same unemployment rate for Libya over the last 5 years, ranging from 20-35% with not enough detail to compare with other indicators. But the public sector spending fall is clear. In a country that only went through limited privatization before 2011, there is a lot of dependence on the state (health, education, utilities). The current partition is the source of the majority of economic woes in Libya, be it the cash shortage, medical shortage, education delays, or miscellaneous subsidy delays. In the end, nothing can improve without proper institutions. This is a bit of a cop-out but it remains a true fact about Libya.

The current developments between the various parties in Libya, especially following Hafter’s recent interview and the Vienna conference on the 16th of May, have been interesting to say the least. In the variety of analysis on the solutions in Libya, including those editorials endorsing certain figures, there is a lack of understanding where each party stands in bargaining for a position of power.

To simplify the conflict I will do away with the smaller tribal conflicts in the south and the pervasive new crime wave across Libya. The reason is that compared to the other features I will mention they won’t determine the future of Libya, in other words their weight on any future state is negligible. I also don’t think it is important to analyze arms control when one wants to understand why some parties logically don’t give up. Yes, some groups receive weapons through the porous borders and banana republicans in the middle east, the weapons aren’t more useful or effective than brigade size. In the end it’s just bullets and Ak-47s. The technologically threshold has been maximized for almost all belligerents.

There are two sets of conflicts. This is reached by crude simplification of individual conflicts, and the web of allegiances can be bundled together to determine the aggregate conflict (Fajr vs. GNA vs. Dignity).

On the lowest level there are militias that protect regional interests. These interests are the cities they are from, usually they were the militia that removed Gadaffi loyalists in 2011 from said city. The have local support and political support from similar groups that view them as fellows in the fight against Gadaffi. Some groups are multi-city troops. For instance Hafter’s 2014 insurgency against Islamist militias was formed from anti-islamists militias and military units reformed by the General National Congress (GNC) and National Transitional Council (NTC). In the need to keep this analysis broadly about the general conflict, suffusive to say most of the Operation Dignity’s political support comes from Eastern Libya, due to figures from there supporting Hafter and Hafter’s reciprocal support for some of their military figures. In the west, Misratan militias have almost full support in Misrata and contain unique centralized leadership tied to the municipal government of Misrata. Again, due to the war in 2011 the Misrata faction receives political and regional support. This for Misrata extends weakly from Misrata all the way to Zawiyah and the Nafusa mountains. There is a inverse relationship between the distance from Misrata and the acceptance of Misrata based security forces. With the GNA, it seems Misrata may enjoy extended support if it becomes the “LNA” for the Government of National Accord (GNA). There are similar groups in Tripoli, Nafusa Mountains, Zintan, Zawiyah and Sabratha.

The groups mentioned above have alliances amongst each other. In the case of the non-LNA party they have allegiances formed due to cooperation in the revolution and subsequent cooperation to lobby (more accurately threaten) public officials of the first GNC to give out contracts to militias and ban Gadaffi-era officials from military posts amongst other positions. The dignity operation is the formed from former Gadaffi brigades who revolted at sometime in the war, a minority consisting of “new” army trained by the NTC, Zintani city militia and tribal militias From the Northeast.

In the Zintani and GNC government militias conflict, it is a proxy for the general Fajr (Misrata, Tripoli militia alliance)-Dignity conflict. For the last few months there has been a cease fire with territorial control centred around the Gheryan. The point of consideration here is that Gheryan is geographically a focal point. The road to Gheryah from Azziyah leads to the mountain pass to the city and then to much of the Nafusa mountains. Thus behind Geryhan is an expectation that one’s enemy will plan primary checkpoints around the city depending on their geographical starting point. Much like a river is a common retreat point for armies. It is an equilibrium solution if both parties decide that eventually they prefer to concede (for a limited time), assuming they know each other’s expectation. This same focal point ceasefire is seen going west from Gheryan to the Tunisian border and down to Sebha. Both parties here have not confused their intentions. All parties have it in their best interest to avoid incidents like the Tripoli Airport conflict.

This is not observed in the more political and aggregate conflict. There is no focal point between Hafter and GNC (now GNA). The main reason is information. There have been no clichés, incentives or any informational clues that can solve the tacit bargain for seat of power in Libya. One important consideration is that in any war in which there is tacit limited conflict the consideration of focal points can help parties find some resolution since the war is not zero-sum. Misrata and LNA don’t face each other in conflict at all. There is no way to understand what plan they have as a contingency when they fail. Or what is is the “second” best result. There is clearly here confusion in the conflict. There is no river, no mountain pass, no Nash equilibrium in this limited war.

Moreover, my main argument is that in fact the confusion that leads to the institutional lack of focal point is that inside theses parties, in any of their parts, there is a lack of information on leadership, structure, and goals. Consider Hafter, he was decried by the newly elected parliament before its official formation in Tobruk. Then he was accepted, since then he has yet to appear in front of parliament to report on advancements in their fight against the Shura Council in Benghazi, a militant jihadist group. This lack of communication between a military general and the government makes the door to political reconciliation difficult to open. There is no focal point politically if the goals of Hafter are not known. He may be a rogue general, it is nearly impossible to make an educated guess.

The internal communication issues exist in the alliance between the Libyan Revolutionaries Operations Room (LROR) and Misrata. Besides a few skirmishes in eastern Tripoli that I remember being reported only faintly (only because it was common in Tripoli to attack groups who arrest your militia members for crimes), the alliance is weak. They don’t form a proper operations room or military. They don’t share a point of command in any government. Thus, they don’t share a plan or strategy. The formation of an operations room by the new UN-supported GNA from Misrata brigades and their closest allies is trying to fill this gap by having the Presidential Council become the point of decision making for all militias so that they can eventually organize themselves into a structured command without relying on Gadaffi-era members. Regardless, they are independent operations with self-involved goals. This makes it unknown to the parliament, the UN, and Hafter what is their internal logic and expectations from the conflict.

So, the focal point is non-existent in the Libyan war. The Vienna talks might reveal a new focal point if it pushes the parliament in Tobruk to accept the GNA, causing concessions between groups as a communication channel opens. However, if Hafter remains difficult with the media (and public officials who govern him from Tobruk) and the Tripoli based militias lack internal control then the rising confusion leads to no general political focal point for Libya. Simple symbolic signals are important too. LROR and Misrata brigades don’t have the same uniforms, not between both groups or within each one separately. This further makes Libyans and their opponents skeptical of their current efforts anywhere.

It may seem the details I have discussed here are unnecessary for the conflict resolution. Certainly this thesis of confusion in the game of war is never discussed by any articles I have read on Libya. Articles focus on ideology of groups, which is important when discussing the ISIL, Ansari Alshari, and Shura Council of Benghzi. However, there is little to no use in islamist or liberal labels to explain the rest of the war. To put it bluntly, the most anti-Hafter city is Misrata due to the fear of rogue generals. The experience of Misrata in 2011 is dreadful and the city arguably will need another decade to recover, politically and economically. Same in Benghazi, where militias who use the word “revolutionary,” to excuse their assassinations and murder recked, havoc and killed a beloved ambassador. This experiential perspective of two unique cities in the conflict started the issues we face today. To solve it, some communication must happen so that at least both sides get systemic access to each others true expectations. This seem frightfully simple, and supposing this is the solution I won’t be surprised by the hindsight laden article in any publication noting that dialogue was a solution all along. Dialogue may seem simple in hindsight, but dialogue is hard to do and many individuals are preoccupied with ISIL sleeper cells and new governments. Hardly do they have time to revisit the structure of their command completely and commit to rationalizing the expectations of their enemy.

There is more to discuss about the conflict. In fact, as I noted in one of my previous posts, I find the conflict ripe for the type game theory analysis that deals with information asymmetry and reputation, likely with multiple equilibria. The question becomes, in which “solution” is Libya a democracy and can one predict it. There is no focal point in Libya and if there is no focal point I can’t adequately predict a resolution.

Note: All sources on militias completed by foreign or local sources is bound to be incomplete, like I noted the structures intra-militias isn’t always well defined due to lack of proper leadership and anarchic banditry.

PS I highly recommend Chapter 3 and 4 from Thomas Schelling’s great book, The Strategy of Conflict. There are a lot of great Libyan writers and journalists. Mohamed Eljarh is great. Also, this site run by Jason Pack, a History PhD at Cambridge University, is wonderful.